


lost my shape trying to act casual

by friendly_ficus



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Dialogue Heavy, Gen, Light Angst, Spoilers for episode 104, but also a little bit of a canon divergece, i will make these characters sit down and talk things out or so help me, there's a little pining in this but it really isn't a fic about shipping
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-31
Updated: 2020-07-31
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:40:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25626070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/friendly_ficus/pseuds/friendly_ficus
Summary: “It’s okay,” Yasha says, voice low. She’s looking into the distance, over the water.“I don’t—”The mist curls up around them, softening the night shadows.“I didn’t feel guilty either,” she murmurs, laying a hand on Beau’s shoulder. The tips of her fingers just brush the jade of the tattoo on the back of her neck. “We do what has to be done.”
Relationships: Beauregard Lionett & Yasha
Comments: 1
Kudos: 37





	lost my shape trying to act casual

**Author's Note:**

> AU where stuff just takes one extra day (aka i wrote this mostly during the first half and the break so we didn’t get anything from the second half) the idea here is that they spend a day just hanging out in the cool boat graveyard. why? so this fic can happen i guess

Before today, Beau never gave much thought to fighting Caduceus. 

Maybe that had been naive. She’s got a couple plans for Caleb and Fjord, spent a few weeks considering Yasha’s weaknesses when she’d been turned. Backup stuff, the kind of things you never want to bring out of their boxes. Maybe she should make one for everyone.

_ Fuck,  _ does she want to be the kind of friend who does that? Does she need to be? Does  _ someone  _ need to be?

(Jester snarled something under her breath, plea and invocation, and Beau had moved through the water like a javelin, like a shark. And she hit Caduceus. And she hit Caduceus. And it was the right thing to do; and she hit Caduceus again.)

“I’ll take first watch,” Yasha says, when they’re all breathing in the clean air of the dome, free of the smell of rotting wood. “Beau will too.”

“She will?” Fjord asks, sending the monk a look. 

(Caduceus’ skull was hard under her knuckles. Jester’s blessing brushed against her skin, a whisper-light barrier between her and the depths, and the water hadn’t slowed her swings at all.)

“Beau?” Jester murmurs, nudging her.

“Uh, yeah. Yes. First watch, yeah.” Beau shakes herself, pushes away the  _ crunch  _ of cartilage under her fist. 

“Come on,” Yasha says quietly, just for Beau. “I found a nice spot.”

So she follows Yasha over a couple ships until they’re sitting side by side on the edge of a creaking deck, the rest of the Nein within eyeshot under the dome. It’s quiet, just the water lapping at the ships and the occasional groan of wood from the crush of them, pushed to one side of the cave. It’s dark enough that Beau can almost see the glowing blooms lurking beneath the surface. 

“What did you think of Asarius?” Yasha asks, breaking the silence.

“Huh?”

“Asarius, what did you think of it.”

Beau frowns, trying to recall it. Dairon had been there—it had  _ mattered  _ that Dairon was there, because Beau was  _ right  _ and there  _ was  _ more going on behind the war—and before that there’d been the rift beneath the city and Caleb had been charmed and Yasha had been charmed and they’d fought, they’d had to fight.

(Caduceus looked at her with his usual expression, maybe a little frustration at her getting in the way. It had been nothing at all, to strike. Well, no, it was everything to hit him, every instinct in her screaming to save them all, but it wasn’t  _ difficult.) _

“It was kinda cool,” she offers, and Yasha hums a little.

“I stabbed Caleb there,” she says, and Beau blinks.

“Been thinking about it? Because I think you could still take him if you wanted,” Beau jokes, leaning into Yasha’s side for a moment. Yasha’s like a mountain. A hot mountain. A hot mountain who can play the harp and likes flowers and could probably beat up a minotaur if she wanted to.

Her voice wrenches Beau back into focus. “Sometimes things remind me of it. Like today, with Caduceus.”

Beau leans away again, pondering. Her side feels cold, damp air rushing to slip back through the gaps in her vestments. Yasha fighting Caleb wasn’t the only thing to happen in that well, after all.

“Do you think about when we fought, too?” she asks, a little worried. Okay, a lot worried.

“Which  _ time?”  _ Yasha says, the bitterness in her voice coming as a surprise. Beau takes a breath to... apologize? Maybe? But Yasha’s already shaking her head. “No, that’s not what I mean. I mean...” 

She trails off and Beau wants so badly to look at her or take her hand or something, but she can’t right now, can’t bring herself to look at the woman beside her. Mist is rising from the water as the temperature slowly drops, gradually filling up the cave. 

“I  _ mean, _ ”  Yasha says at last, “are you  _ okay?” _

Beau has a dozen deflections ready for questions like that, usually, but she’s coming up completely empty this time. 

“He thanked me,” is what she ends up saying. “I punched him in the head and he thanked me. He was  _ bleeding.  _ What kind of... What am I supposed to do with that?”

She feels more than sees Yasha nod. “Caduceus can be a little weird.”

“You ate a flower like two days ago.”

“I didn’t say he was the only one,” Yasha laughs, and Beau tries not to treasure it so much. “But I didn’t ask about Caduceus. I want to know about you.”

(Caduceus had a hard head. It hadn’t stopped Beau for a second.) 

Beau doesn’t  _ like  _ that she’s dedicated hours to figuring out ways to take Yasha down, that she’s weighed herself against Fjord and Caleb and their promises to keep each other in line. It feels...

“I feel... bad,” she says slowly. “But not bad about hitting him.”

“No,” Yasha agrees. “I don’t feel bad about Asarius, with Caleb.”

“Shouldn’t we, though? Wouldn’t... Look, Jester would feel bad. And Jester’s a good person.”  _ So a good person would feel bad,  _ she doesn’t say,  _ so maybe we’re not good people. _

“There are a lot of good people,” Yasha allows. “And Jester might feel bad, but she’d still hit back.”

They pass another few minutes in silence, just breathing. Beau can’t tell what she’s supposed to be thinking, can’t tell what she’s supposed to be feeling. It’s... it should feel worse, probably, but where she goes to look for guilt she only finds the certainty of her hands in motion.

“It’s okay,” Yasha says, voice low. She’s looking into the distance, over the water.

“I don’t—”

The mist curls up around them, softening the night shadows. 

“I didn’t feel guilty either,” she murmurs, laying a hand at the junction of Beau’s shoulder. The tips of her fingers just brush the jade of the tattoo on the back of her neck. “We do what has to be done.”

They don’t look at each other. Against Beau’s skin, her hand is warm.

**Author's Note:**

> title for this fic comes from “Crosseyed and Painless” by the Talking Heads. stop making sense is the gift that keeps on giving.  
> i’ve written about episode 55 before, from jester’s perspective, but i really felt like there were parallels to tonight. having to fight your party member to break a compulsion on them really provides quality angst imo, but the m9 have encountered this situation enough times that i think their perspectives on it wouldn’t be the typical guilt; beau feels guilty in this fic because she _doesn’t_ feel bad about punching caduceus a bunch of times, and yasha is able to comfort her by pointing out that they have this kind of thing in common. i care them.  
> leave a comment and let me know what you think! :)


End file.
